She associated the 328i sedan with money and youth and stories of redeeming heroes like those told in Grisham novels.

And it reminded her of Daniel simply because it was his vehicle of choice. He was a good friend, a good man, already several years her senior when she met him, but he taught her about the appeal of an intelligent woman with or without a fine frame. He told her she had a laugh that made him want to install her in his villa and he confessed he wanted to take her to the edges of the earth to meet strangers, awe her with travels to learn from cultures vastly different from her tiny home town and promised she’d learn to love richness measured in ways far different from the standards of the West. He was in Argentina this year with a woman he felt was young enough to keep up with his itinerary and fluent enough to keep him out of trouble in the outback.

No regrets that today she was not on an exotic trip. She was here in a classic weekend scene. No, the sea of cars was not teeming with life, and certainly no sails on the horizon. But she was aware, alert, present in the moment. Ready.

Looking up she saw its owner. Not so tall, his full head of graying hair, a jawline that belied his age. She watched as he hit the fob and she heard the blip of the horn alert her to the lock of his door. A long day ahead in the field house and already she needed a nap. In her mind she snapped shut an appealing plan to crawl into the backseat of his Beamer and fall asleep in the sun.

She locked her gaze with his and casually smiled and turned away. She never tired of the connection of two bodies through an appreciative glance, the easy grin following the shared moment. She continued walking to her truck, slipped in the driver’s seat and left for The Moka Shop. A few miles round trip, one hazelnut latte and a large black coffee to go and she was on her way back.

When she returned, the black BMW was no longer in its parking stall.

It was at the curb.

He was in it.

His window was rolled down.

She parked. Exited. And slid into the passenger seat of the black sedan and casually handed over his beverage and asked him if he had enjoyed the Chicago convention.

He looked over her shoulder at the entrance to the venue and took a sip and sighed and confessed, “You should have been there. I missed your body in the night, baby, but worse, I missed the opportunity to show you my city. ”

She thought briefly of the sound of his hand hitting the dash when she told him she wasn’t going to make it and the rough way he grabbed her by the back of the neck and kissed her in a way that said he was so needing to be with her but he understood her limitations.

She didn’t cry when she told him it wasn’t going to happen. And she almost loved him for making time to be with her today.

When he drove she felt well-cared for and respected. Whenever they managed to see each other, she found reassurance when he asked her to meet and park her car and get in with him. When she was with him, it was clear he was the driver. She took her hands off the wheel. She let herself simply be.

The sultry tone of Diana Krall came over the sound system and she kicked off her heels and pushed the auto recline on the side of the leather seat. Her thighs were open to the sunshine flooding the interior through the open roof and her knees separated the foot or so of space she needed to fully relax her legs and stretch in ways bleacher seating did not allow. Day two of basketball tournament had her wound up for his touch just as much as she was ground down by the incessant whistles and horns and the endless chatter of tourney parents. She needed space.

As he sped to the edge of town she was grateful he knew the city and when he didn’t he faked it. He had the room booked, key in hand and a few weeks of missing-you-babe-texts weighing on his conscience and hitting him heavy below the belt. There wasn’t much time but fleeting moments were not wasted these days. In the past, yes, she’d hold out for a full afternoon with him. Now, she jumped at the opportunity to meet for an hour or two and maybe have lunch after.

She slipped her wedding band into the pill case in the center of purse and fixed her lipstick in the mirror.

His hand solidly locked on her knee and traveled under her hem, blatantly stroking her inner thigh to the wet nylon of her panties and gripping her hard just outside the pulsing heat between her legs. He hooked a finger inside the cotton and easily dipped his longest finger under the scrap of fabric to find the wet of her folds. He loved how wet she was for him, always ready for him, and he tasted the white cream on his finger and wrapped his tongue around the tip lest he waste a drop of her want.

.

.

She had always been a little weak in the knees for a successful man in a suit and the opportunity for some love-fucking in the sunshine of the day.

Like this:

Darling, there is no other woman at the bar. I don’t know what you are talking about.

Oh! My comment about Ms. Elusive was not in reference to some young thing sitting there across the dimly lit lounge.

No worries!

I was referring to your client who has refused to sign the paperwork you need to move the project forward. I know you are meeting her for cocktails tonight at 7 and I know you will charm her socks off, in the most professional way of course. And you, with your unconventional approach, will get the job done.

I love how you make it all come together. You’ll lock up the deal and make your 4th QB and it will be top sales cruise for you. Hot. Love that about you and how well you do what you do.

Let me assure you, I am never jealous. I do envy sometimes, yes. But I am never jealous.

If there is someone in the room who catches your eye I might ask you to go and talk with her. And in this way, I may be able to invite her to my bed. Mine first.

I will consider sharing later, though.

Or perhaps, as you are ending the evening you see that pretty blonde, aviators perched on top of her head, and those lovely golden shoulders. She is still checking you out. Yes, I see she seems to have your tongue tied in knots and your foot tapping impatiently. Point her out to me again. I cannot keep track of all the lovelies who fawn over you. Don’t worry yourself; she’s the one I’ll gently touch on the shoulder, will offer to buy her a beverage and then introduce her to my man behind the Ray Bans.

Oh, you are going home to your wife? I must remember to thank you for your attentiveness to her every whim. She must have taught you that lovely move you do with your tongue. And I’ll bet she helped you perfect the compliments you give on the birthdays I so despise.

Jealousy is a wasted emotion, Hon. I know it well and will have none of it.

Kiss me now and taste me on your fingertips if you need to know if I am still Yours even though I know you’ll make me repeat it over and over as I rise above you tonight.

It’s okay, darling.

I’m all Yours.

I’m all Yours right now, in this moment. I. Am. All. Yours.

.

.

At what point did she stop doing everything to make him happy and start doing everything to keep him from being angry?

Like this:

In my future, I envision making my Fridays- known here as the quietest of on-line days- into adventure days.

Hours upon hours of creative musing…languorous and luscious hours steeped in the flavours of love making and perhaps, just a pinch of spirited play.

A full day, sprinkled liberally, of course, with conversation leading to pillow fights, feathers everywhere and then, a ring of the bell to have the service come in to turn down the bed and draw my bath and maybe stay a while, to watch.

Like this:

“Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist-a master-and that is what Auguste Rodin was-can look at an old woman, portray her exactly as she is…and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be…and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, or even you, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply imprisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart…no matter what the merciless hours have done to her. Look at her, Ben. Growing old doesn’t matter to you and me; we were never meant to be admired-but it does to them.” ― Robert A. Heinlein

Read some Heinlein. Read anything. Read.

# for Reticent Mental Property on Quote Day. Picture credit to the web at Artistsandillustrators.co.uk

Just when you think the forces of swerfdom have reached peak batshittery something comes along that is so jawdroppingly bad that your ideas about just how much you are hated for selling sexual services have to be reevaluated. For this to happen twice in a week is the reason many activists, and simply sex workers like me who have an opinion, avoid anything in the mainstream about sex work. You quickly run out of spoons when the constant refrain is rape, rape and a sprinkling of racist neo colonial hetronomative patriarchy.